Roger Waters Compares Israel to Nazi Germany

Pink Floyd vocalist says in interview that Israel's policy is similar to what went on in the 1930s in Germany.

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Elad Benari, 09/12/13 04:12

Roger Waters

Reuters

Anti-Israel musician Roger Waters is at it again.

The former member of Pink Floyd, who has previously faced criticism for virulently anti-Israel statements and for using anti-Israel and anti-Jewish imagery in his shows, has compared Israel to Nazi Germany. The comments were made in an interview Waters gave Saturday to Frank Barat of the CounterPunch magazine.

Waters was asked what he would tell artists who say that culture should not be boycotted and who choose to perform in Israel, to which he replied, “The situation in Israel/Palestine, with the occupation, the ethnic cleansing and the systematic racist apartheid Israeli regime is unacceptable.”

“So for an artist to go and play in a country that occupies other people’s land and oppresses them the way Israel does, is plain wrong,” stated Waters. “They should say no. I would not have played for the Vichy government in occupied France in the Second World War, I would not have played in Berlin either during this time. Many people did, back in the day. There were many people that pretended that the oppression of the Jews was not going on. From 1933 until 1946. So this is not a new scenario. Except that this time it’s the Palestinian people being murdered.”

“Anybody who looks at the situation will see that if you choose not to take up arms to fight your oppressor, the non violent route, and the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which started in Palestine with 100% support from Palestinian civil society in 2004-2005, a movement that has now been joined by many people around the world, the global civil society, is a legitimate form of resistance to this brutal and oppressive regime,” he declared.

“The voice, for instance, of the right wing rabbinate, which is so bizarre and hard to hear that you can hardly believe that it’s real,” charged Waters. “They believe some very weird stuff you know, they believe that everybody that is not a Jew is only on earth to serve them and they believe that the Indigenous people of the region that they kicked off the land in 1948 and have continued to kick off the land ever since are sub-human.”

“The parallels with what went on in the 30’s in Germany are so crushingly obvious that it doesn’t surprise me that the movement that both you and I are involved in is growing every day,” he claimed. “The Russell Tribunal on Palestine was trying to shed light on this when we met, I only took part in two sessions, you took part in many more. It is an extremely obvious and fundamental problem of human rights which every thinking human being should apply himself to.”

Waters also blasted what he called “the propaganda machine that starts in Israeli schools and that continues through all the Netanyahu’s bluster is poured all over the United States, not just Fox but also CNN and in fact in all the mainstream media.”

He went on to claim that Israel’s warnings against Iran’s nuclear weapons program are “a diversionary tactic,” and also claimed that “no Israeli government has been serious about creating a Palestinian state since 1948.”

“They’ve always had the Ben Gurion agenda of kicking all the Arabs out of the country and becoming greater Israel,” charged Waters. “They tell a lie as part of their propaganda machinery whilst doing the other thing but they have been doing it so obviously in the last 10 years....This is so transparent that you’d have to have an IQ above room temperature not to understand what is going on. It is just dopey.”

Most recently, Waters released a giant balloon pig bearing the Star of David during a concert in Belgium. Concert-goers said the Jewish star was among several symbols representing various corporations and fascist movements.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center blasted Rogers over his latest insulting use of Jewish symbols. “By floating a pig balloon stamped with the Star of David at his concert, Roger Waters has moved to the front of the line of anti-Semites,” the group said in a statement.